Convergence

by David M Henley

  ‘Okay, I’ll let you go. I’ve taken up too much of your time, but I just have one last thing to tell you.’

  ‘Fine. Go on.’

  The avatar breathed in and bowed like a performer. When it straightened, it smiled. ‘You’ve just been hakked.’

  Takashi disappeared. Geof tried to follow, but was quickly lost in a spaghetti of false trails. He felt his real-world shoulder being prodded and he demersed.

  Lys Foster was poking him with a wand. ‘Excuse me. Who were you just talking to?’

  Admiral Shreet lived alone, technically, in a self-sufficient capsule separated from the other stations. The Admiral had been isolated twenty-one years ago when the fear of psionic manipulation began rising and the Will demanded that the person in his position should live in isolation. Everyone who had contact with him saw him as a hologram or avatar. Or just a voice that had the power to lower your energy ration. He stood staring out his large viewing window at the planet below.

  Earth was like a glazed blue bowl covering the black sky. Its expanse made it almost impossible to determine if it was concave or convex.

  Shreet wondered how he would ever be able to trust Earth again. No matter what happened, how would he know who or what was controlling the Will?

  ‘What are you quandering about?’ Dot asked.

  His replica wife hadn’t aged a day. She was a copy — very much frowned upon down below, but he didn’t see it the way they did. He wasn’t necrophilic or self-delusional for having a replica of someone he had lost. It was, for him, like keeping an old photo; one that could hold his hand in the darkness.

  She came closer to console him, wearing one of his dress shirts. As a replica she behaved as she had done, employed her common terms and phrases, her sweet expressions.

  ‘Everything.’

  ‘That’s a lot of thing,’ she answered.

  Shreet smiled. This was one of the jokes the replica had adopted from the original. He touched her hand. ‘I miss you.’

  ‘I’m here.’

  ‘No, the real you.’

  ‘The real me would be old.’

  ‘I am old.’

  ‘You could be rejuved. You saw how well Abe Pinter looked.’

  He didn’t reply and returned to his vigil over the slowly turning Earth.

  ‘I am wondering what to call it,’ he said after a moment. ‘We have always been Greater Earth. If we become independent, we will need a name for ourselves.’

  ‘What’s in a name?’ she asked playfully.

  There was some truth to her question. Did a name change the nature of the thing being named?

  ‘Names can be important,’ he said. ‘Without one we have no definition. If we don’t name ourselves, someone else will. And what are we to those below? Spacies? Is that it?’ Or are we the darkness that calls? That holds the real control over their lives?

  ‘I was not meaning to mock.’

  ‘Good. Since our foundation we have existed solely for the benefit of Earth. The people will need something new to latch onto.’

  ‘I’m sure you will think of something,’ she said and smiled. ‘Come to bed. You need rest.’

  ‘What do you think of calling it “Sol”?’

  ‘It sounds nice. And it’s in the parlance already.’

  ‘There are two masters out here, Dot. The infinity of space, and the sun. It is our star that unites us. She is the mother of light and life, and space is darkness and death.’

  Dot dropped his hand and stood back from him. She looked different suddenly.

  ‘What is it?’ he asked.

  ‘Listen very carefully, Admiral,’ the replica said in a voice he didn’t know. ‘This body no longer speaks as your wife. Do you understand?’

  ‘No, I don’t understand. How dare you hakk my wife? This is a despicable crime.’

  ‘I request your forgiveness, but circumstances dictate the breaking of certain human protocols.’

  ‘Human protocols? Who are you?’

  ‘I am an independent intelligence and I speak for the World Union.’

  ‘How dare you? Where is the Prime?’

  His wife changed to another voice. ‘Hello, Admiral Shreet? My name is Takashi Shima.’

  ‘You?’

  ‘Yes, me.’

  ‘Get out of my wife this instant.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Admiral. I mean no disrespect, but it was the only way to contact you.’

  ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I just need to speak with you for a moment. It concerns the lives of everyone on Earth.’

  ‘I’ll listen, but Earth is no longer our concern.’

  ‘We need Greater Earth, Admiral. Please.’

  ‘There is no Greater Earth now,’ Shreet replied.

  ‘Admiral, please,’ Dot said in Takashi’s voice. ‘This is a mistake. Did Pinter tell you to quarantine us?’

  ‘Yes. And it appears he was right.’

  ‘Yeah? Actually, he was under psionic manipulation the whole time.’

  ‘You’re lying.’

  ‘No, I’m not. He told me himself.’

  ‘Then he is free now? What happened to him?’

  ‘He had a female companion who was controlling him. A few hours ago a robot saved him. It tranquillised the companion and Pinter was released.’

  ‘A robot?’

  ‘Yes. It says it is an AI of some sort. I have one here with me,’ Takashi said.

  ‘An AI? On Earth?’

  ‘That’s what it tells me.’

  ‘Sweet mir. For how long was he under her, or their, control?’

  ‘Since he was rejuvenated.’

  Shreet blanched. ‘That means the last time we spoke …?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And he told me to secede from Earth?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Admiral.’

  ‘Oh, great space, what have we done?’

  ‘It is not too late. The Will is being purged and rebuilt as we speak. We will need Greater Earth’s help in rebuilding.’

  ‘But I have operations underway for expansion. I can’t reverse them now without losing people.’

  ‘We need you. And we need the weapons net back.’

  The weapons net … why would they? Shreet’s thoughts hurried to catch up.

  ‘I can’t do that.’

  ‘Admiral. You have to trust me.’

  ‘I don’t even know who you are. You could be a simulation for all I know. I’ve never even met you, and from what I’ve heard, you’re always in trouble.’

  ‘Everything you’ve heard is true. And I am in trouble. Everyone down here is. And we need your help.’

  ‘There is nothing I can do for you.’

  ‘Just hear me out. That’s all I ask. Will you listen a moment longer?’ Dot was hunched over, palms out in mild supplication.

  ‘Alright, go on with it.’

  ‘Pinter told you to secede when he was under their control. A psi made him do that. Why would they do that?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘But you are dancing to their tune.’

  ‘How dare you? I didn’t know he was being controlled, but it is done now.’

  ‘It isn’t done from where I’m sitting,’ Takashi said.

  ‘That’s precisely why I won’t get Sol involved. Even if Pinter was under psionic control, he was right when he said I shouldn’t trust anyone from the planet.’

  ‘You’ve been tricked. We all were.’

  ‘Have you settled the situation with the psis?’ Shreet asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Have you restored the Will?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Is Pierre Jnr still at large?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then there is nothing I can do for you.’

  The replica paused. ‘Actually, Admiral,’ Dot made a grimace he hadn’t seen before, a wide, froglike smirk, ‘I’ve already got what I came for. I just needed your time.’

  ‘What the devil?’

  ‘Goodb
ye, Admiral.’

  Dot stood blinking at him. Her gentle smile returned. ‘Well? Are you coming to bed or not?’

  When Peter Lazarus awoke, he was not alone. That robot was there, standing above him as before, that almost faceless android. He felt panic, the clones’ screams were piercing his ears, the red of emergency, cut through with a sword of light. The clone tanks sparked, their lumens blinked out and his head throbbed with silent pain.

  ‘No …’ he said, feeling the echo of the memory.

  ‘Do not be frightened,’ the robot said.

  ‘Get away from me!’

  ‘Please be calm.’

  Pete stood up and looked around him. He was surprised to find he was outside in sunlight, on a hill with dehydrated vegetation. ‘Who sent you?’ he asked.

  ‘Not this again,’ the robot said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Never mind. I am Sib 3. I am here to help you.’

  ‘Help me with what?’

  ‘What do you need?’

  ‘I have to get to Atlantic.’

  ‘I can help you with that.’

  ‘You can?’

  ‘As easily as parting the seas,’ Sib said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It is an old reference. I thought you might know it.’

  ‘I’ve never heard it.’

  ‘You heard it in a history lesson when you were ten.’

  ‘I did?’

  ‘You drew a picture of it and you won a prize.’

  ‘How do you know this?’

  ‘I know everything. Every piece of recorded data I can reach.’

  Pete’s heart rate leapt up again and he had to sit back down. ‘You’re just like the mirror. What are you doing? What do you want now?’

  ‘I am sorry that I reminded you of the personality conditioning mirror. That was not my intention. I was trying to show an act of good faith to gain your trust.’

  ‘By messing up my mind?’

  ‘I was trying to tell you that your past is not lost. I remember everything that has ever been recorded about you.’

  The robot sat down and waited.

  ‘Where’s Hector?’

  ‘I have returned him to his home.’

  ‘Oh … thank you.’ Pete swallowed. ‘I was going to let him go.’

  ‘I believe you.’

  ‘Somebody must have sent you.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You’re working for someone?’

  ‘No,’ Sib said.

  ‘Is my name really Peter Lazarus?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And did I,’ Pete swallowed, ‘have a sister?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then when did I … when did I start thinking I did?’

  ‘I don’t know. I can’t read minds.’

  ‘Do you know when I first met him?’

  ‘Pierre Jnr?’

  ‘Yes. How long have I been under his control?’

  ‘I don’t know that either. After your escape, you were outside of our monitoring.’

  ‘So you don’t know everything?’

  ‘No. But I know more than you.’

  ‘How do I know this isn’t a trap? You could be leading me to the barricade and then you’ll let it shoot me out of the sky.’

  ‘I can appreciate from your point of view that that is a possibility.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘If that were my intention, there are simpler ways. You can take as much time as you need to decide.’

  ‘I want to talk to someone.’

  ‘Who would you like to speak to?’

  ‘Geof Ozenbach.’

  ‘He is not available at this time.’

  ‘Then the Prime.’

  ‘I am with him now. Please accept the connection request.’

  Pete’s symb pinged him and he gave a knock back, letting the avatar of Abercrombie Pinter appear in his vision.

  ‘Hello, Peter.’ It surprised him again to see the young version of the Colonel. He had forgotten he wasn’t the man he had first met. Even his voice was different.

  ‘How do I know that this is real?’

  ‘How do I know you’re real, Peter?’

  ‘You let me go.’

  ‘It wasn’t by my choice. I was under telepathic control.’

  ‘And now you’re not?’

  ‘No. The sib freed me.’

  ‘I’m sorry that happened to you.’

  ‘Are you? That’s good to hear.’

  ‘So why haven’t you collected me yet? If you are free?’

  ‘I can disable you at any moment. You know that. I want to know what your intentions are.’

  ‘I have to warn Tamsin.’

  ‘Warn her about what?’

  ‘I have to tell her what is happening. She has to do something.’

  ‘May I ask a question?’ Sib said.

  Pete looked at the strange robot. He was too used to talking to people and knowing what was in their minds, but here was a thing who had no mind he could reach. A thing that seemed to have thoughts of its own, but must surely be operated or programmed by another.

  ‘Ask.’

  ‘How have you surmised that the leader of the psi revolution is unaware of what is happening?’ Sib asked.

  ‘She mustn’t be. I know she wants freedom, but she wouldn’t go this far.’

  ‘I must not have the evidence you do. My calculations indicate that she is aware.’

  ‘Peter,’ the Prime spoke. ‘You knew her before she was taken by Pierre Jnr. You of all people understand what happens.’

  We become the water. For a moment Pete couldn’t remember anything from the days before. He remembered waking up and the screams of the clones, and being saved by the robot that stood before him.

  In his own mind, Peter Lazarus couldn’t picture his own face. He was sure he had many times seen his reflection in a mirror or window, even photographs and footage … but on trying to recall his own features he found himself unable to do so.

  He rubbed his hand over his face, feeling out his cheeks, rough with stubble, the outline of his jawbone and lips.

  ‘Tamsin Grey has been integral to the proliferation of the psionic relays, Pete. You are a telepath. Why do you want to stop the formation of a global mind? Why do so many others desire what you resist?’

  I don’t know, he felt like answering. Wouldn’t it be paradise? The world with ultimate freedom? No restrictions, no confinement.

  ‘Pierre,’ Peter said.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘He is doing all this. But … I don’t believe he means to.’

  ‘And you think going to Tamsin Grey will achieve something? You will convince her to turn against Pierre Jnr?’ Pinter asked.

  ‘I have to try.’

  ‘Okay then. You can go through.’

  ‘Really? I can trust you?’

  ‘So long as you have that thing on your arm I can find you.’ The Prime winked.

  ‘Thanks for the reminder.’

  ‘Good luck.’

  Pinter’s avatar faded out.

  Before the new gates of Shima Palace, people waited. A woman in a yellow dress with the psi symbol stitched in black across her front stood with a group of protestors shouting at the unresponsive building.

  ‘Yield, House of Shima!’ she hollered. ‘Make way for the coming of Pierre Jnr. Open your gates and your souls. He comes,’ she said and two boys behind her smashed their hammers on large gongs. ‘Prepare for the coming of the Lord of the Mind.’

  As if in answer, the gongs of the palace, large ceremonial brass bells that hung concealed in each wall, rang out eight times to indicate that it was eight o’clock at night and something was about to happen.

  As the low tones faded into the ground, fireworks exploded from the rooftop accompanied by festive lasers of many colours. Great bursts of silver sparks and neon darts flashed into the night sky. An invitation was seeded into the new Weave for everyone near and far to come to Shima Palace to witness the wedding of Sato Sh
ima and Earl Grimshaw. It was a public feast to celebrate the joining of two streams and the return of the Will.

  Takashi’s pings were ignored.

  The gongs sounded again and the four great gates opened simultaneously, letting loose a thousand robot dancers in the house colours of Shima and Grimshaw.

  ‘Kutzo, what are they doing now?’ Takashi asked. He began watching through the reconnected eyes of his network and the sparse distribution of drones he had reactivated. Are they actually mad? he asked himself.

  Behind the dancers came musicians and platters of food, rice wine and intoxication for all. Coloured lanterns were raised on ropes, and hung anywhere that would hold a hook.

  Takashi watched the rapid consolidation of dots turning towards his family home.

  You idiots. You’re drawing them right to you.

  Sib sat in the pilot seat, but seemed not to require the controls. They lifted, accelerated and the haze that looked like massing insects grew closer, enlarging to look more like thousands of hawks circling for prey. Pete felt wary.

  ‘There is no cause for alarm,’ the robot said. ‘The blockade will not attack.’

  The barrier of drones, jets and tanks didn’t flinch as their squib approached. Sib sat seemingly relaxed, in that way only machines can. Pete kept looking from it to the approaching wall of automated weaponry. Before them, the crisscrossing drones began spacing themselves, dilating for them to fly through.

  ‘That was easy.’

  ‘There is an armistice. It had to let us through.’

  The ecosystem known as the Cape spread out before him. The desolation of the wastelands bowed to healthier forests that were reclaiming their ancient territory. Pete began sensing people below, encampments in the forests for those who had run from the psi rebellion.

  ‘Did you see those?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What is it like in Atlantic?’

  ‘By all appearances it is peaceful.’

  They flew on, the wilderness zone breaking into pharma fields and Pete felt a thought amplifier in the possession of a man overseeing the daily harvest. As soon as he touched the psi network every tapper in the Cape knew who he was and why he had come.

  This is it. This is what a psi country looks like.

  ‘They have a psi network here,’ he said. ‘That’s how there is peace.’

  ‘Please assure them we mean them no harm,’ the robot said.

  The city proper rolled under them and Pete jumped through the thin network of baubles, from mind to mind, seeing with different eyes, hearing others’ thoughts. He saw what they had been through, felt the concussive change in their lives. He felt their hopes and dreams for the better world they were building. This was their place.